SiddieRun

Episode 2

You Don’t Have To Go Home But You Can’t Stay Here

Sometime before setting out on the S-Team’s mission to Halta, Idris Khan was bathing in her manse, The Blessed Rooftop Garden. While open to the sky, the trees moved around to provide privacy and a branch shaped itself into a tube which poured water upon the Exalt. Suddenly, Kurofa Kachina jumped into her bathing area while hoisting an obviously drunk Zhuī Lóng over her shoulder and loudly complaining that something needed to be done about their friend’s alcoholism.

Furious about the invasion of privacy, the naked Idris yells at the two to get out and that she will see them when she dries off and gets ready. K.K. looks puzzled, takes a breath in, and blows a plume of fire at Idris which dries her and conveniently, through burning, acts as a depilatory. K.K. turns and leaves while Idris stares at her surprised and disturbed. At the last second, she shakes her head and tells K.K. to call Unknown Axiom over too.

Twenty minutes latter in an area of the manse that has reoriented itself into a sitting room, Idris comes out to meet with the three other Exalts. With Zhuī passed out on the floor and drooling slightly, K.K. explains that she recently lost possession of her manse in Yu-Shan due to some sort of bureaucratic loop hole, which she totally doesn’t understand, and needs and place to stay. She found Zhuī by chance and would have asked to stay with her but the Chosen of Battles was totally shit-faced and busting up a tea house like some sort of drunken master. So K.K. her up and head to Idris so that they could sort their friend out and so that K.K. could ask to crash with the Chosen of Journeys.

Idris, still more than a little bit peeved, says that Zhuī can’t keep acting the way she does and K.K. can’t stay with her. After all, Zhuī need to act her age and be able to function as an agent of heaven. And K.K. should have a place that is at least partially her own and that she won’t be an annoying and dangerous guest at. After K.K. gives Idris sad puppy-dog eyes, Unknown asks if K.K. has anyone else she can go to. After thinking for a moment, K.K. says there is one person. She has found her Solar mate after a long search… but there is a problem. Her mate’s current incarnation… is a guy.

Idris and Unknown look at each other and look back at K.K. confused, asking what the problem is. Blushing, K.K. explains that she has only taken female form since the girl’s night out they had and has no idea how to act like a woman, to say nothing about how to seduce a man. Unknown Axiom makes a lewd comment which not only makes K.K. blush but seems to strike fear in the warrior’s heart. Idris asks if K.K. loves the guy. She responds in the affirmative, saying, “After all, he was once my wife.” A bit disturbed, Idris and Unknown hatch a plan.

They decide to train both K.K. and the rather butch Zhuī in the feminine arts to prepare the one to meet her mate and to keep an eye on the other. For the entire training time, Zhuī is also forced to quit all drugs and alcohol cold turkey. A training montage ensues, with both K.K. and Zhuī doing rather well in the beginning. Both seem to take to the Celestial tea ceremony and can walk in hells while balancing books on their heads. By the end, however, K.K. stomps of rather unladylike and Zhuī has abused a hidden flask.

With Zhuī off on another bender and K.K. as good as she is going to get, the three present Exalts take Gate 56 to Creation and make their way to a village outside Varangia. This is where K.K.’s mate, Desert Rat, is and here the Exalts plan magic to happen. Before entering Desert Rat’s workshop, K.K. turns to the other two and hands Idris a small artifact resembling a compact, which perfectly matches another which K.K. has. She says that the artifact will allow the Sidereals to look through her eyes and communicate directly with her mind. That way, if she starts to falter, the girls can play Cyrano. The Sidereals wish the Lunar good luck and leave her to meet her mate.

Entering the workshop, K.K. greets Desert Rat and quickly gets to implying a previous connection between the two Exalted. However, once she starts trying to use innuendo, she comes off as clumsy. Quickly, Idris jumps in and provides K.K. with some lines, which seem to work. Still, the Lunar seems reluctant to make more than minimal physical contact. Frustrated, Unknown grabs the artifact from Idris and, in doing so, notices a button on its back. Pressing it, Unknown finds that she can actually connect with K.K. body and direct it, though K.K. seems to be able to take back control if she wants. Seeking to resolve the situation, Unknown take a more direct approve and make’s K.K. unstated carnal intentions known very obviously. After knock everything off a table and pushing Desert Rat onto it, Unknown turns of the device as the scene in the workshop appropriately fades to black.

A couple of days later, Idris and Unknown are hanging out in The Blessed Rooftop Garden with hung over Zhuī, trying to think of a new course of action. The tree’s part and K.K. appears smiling and gives the two cognizant Sidereals a status update, basically saying she will be staying with her mate for a while. Unknown makes another lewd comment, to which a blushing K.K. responds that her mate will be out of commission for a while, muttering something about Strength 6 and Athletics 5 being a bit much for a crafter. Zhuī seems to laugh before looking like she has passed out. Idris asks Zhuī is she is ever going to give up being such a lush, which earns another laugh from the horizontally prone Chosen of Battles. To that, K.K. says she can help and opens a sack out of which a white and green draconic spirit appears. The spirit hovers above Zhuī, who seems to be rapidly be waking up. K.K. say that the beings name is Absin Tainthe, an enlightened spirit of intoxication, and that it can control when and how its owner gets intoxicated. K.K. appropriated the sprit using an invention of her mate’s, which looks suspiciously like a yellow crystal Poké Ball. After arguing with the three other Exalts for a moment, Idris sends Zhuī home and she leaves with her new familiar to mourn the loss of her constant state of intoxicated joy.

K.K. asks if she can stay for just the night, as she is leaving her mate to recover, and Idris obliges. The three remaining Exalts climb into an extra-large hammock made out of leaves and branch to fall asleep under the night sky of Yu-Shan.